Stuart MacBride - Flesh House

‘I’m just saying that this is the end game as far as the Flesher’s concerned. He’s unlikely to come back from this, most likely it’s the start of a spree—’

‘Jesus, that’s even more comforting! The bastard was bad enough when he was in control, can you imagine what he’ll be like now?’

‘HELP ME! PLEASE HELP ME!’ Sobbing in the darkness. ‘PLEASE!’

‘Heather? You awake?’

‘With all that racket going on?’ She rubbed at her eyes, feeling gritty all over. ‘You got any more of those pills? We could both—’

‘They made you feel ill.’

‘I just want to sleep...’

The shouting stopped, replaced by incoherent screaming and the sound of Mrs I’m-a-Police-Officer throwing herself against the metal walls of her prison.

Heather groaned and stared up into the impenetrable dark. ‘Kelley? Tell me a story.’

‘I don’t—’

‘Please?’

‘HELP ME!’

‘I...’ Kelley went silent. ‘I can’t think of anything.’

Heather reached through the bars, feeling for her cellmate’s hand. ‘Tell me about your mum and dad — the nice ones.’

There was a long pause. And then she realized Kelley was crying.

‘Oh God, I’m sorry. It’s OK, you don’t have to.’

A sniff. ‘No. I...’ Kelly squeezed Heather’s hand tight. ‘Once upon a time there was a princess and it was her birthday. She was twelve and she was going to see The Aristocats in the cinema, and have fish and chips for tea.’

‘Kelley, you don’t have to—’

‘They were singing as they drove from their castle in Banchory into the city. The sun was shining—’

‘I’M A POLICE OFFICER!’

‘The sun was shining and they had the windows rolled down. The princess... the princess had been given a big bag of jelly babies for her birthday and she leant forward from the back seat to offer the king and queen some. The king liked the red ones best, and while he was looking for one...’ She stopped. ‘The truck... An evil wizard...’

Heather could feel her trembling on the other side of the bars.

‘It was like being struck by thunder. The noise... oh God, it was the loudest thing I ever heard and there was glass everywhere and mum screamed and then everything went round and round. End over end...’ She squeezed Heather’s hand so hard it hurt. ‘We were upside down at the side of the road and I can’t move and no one else is moving and they’re hanging there... like bats, upside down with their seatbelts on. And there’s blood everywhere .’

‘Oh Kelley, I’m so sorry.’

‘And I’m trapped on the roof of the car and I’m covered with it. Mum and Dad are dead and I’m soaked with blood...’

Rennie stuck the big stack of newspaper on Logan’s desk and crashed into one of the visitor chairs. ‘Where’s Chief Constable Creepy Crippen then?’

‘In with Professional Standards, and don’t be an arsehole.’ Logan flicked through the pile — P&J, Evening Express, Aberdeen Examiner, Scotsman, Observer, a bunch of other broadsheets and a pile of tabloids too. ‘Anything?’

‘Bugger all. No one printed Elizabeth Nichol’s name, never mind her address. Nothing on the radio either, or the telly. Media Department say they didn’t release the details.’

‘So how did the Flesher know where to find her?’

Rennie sagged so far down the plastic seat he was almost on the carpet. ‘Did you...’ He blushed, looked at the stack of papers, coughed. ‘Did you tell anyone about Laura?’

‘What, that you’re a dirty old man and she’s—’

‘She’s fifteen.’ The blush went nuclear.

‘Oh you have got to be kidding me!’

‘I did a PNC check... I swear I thought she was older. She told me she was going to university!’

‘Yeah, when she’s finished her O-levels.’

‘I didn’t know!’ Rennie twitched. ‘You can’t tell anyone, OK? Please! You saw her: she was all over me from the start! I didn’t know!’

‘Bloody hell... fifteen...’

‘She doesn’t look fifteen! You saw her — you bought her drinks in the pub!’

‘Yeah, but there’s a bit of a difference between buying a minor a rum and coke, and painting her with golden syrup then licking it off.’

‘Oh God... I’ll have to go to court... I’ll lose my job! My mum’ll find out! What’ll the papers say?’

‘Probably something classy like, “PC PAEDOPHILE SHOWED ME HIS TRUNCHEON”.’

‘It’s not funny! What am I going to do? If anyone finds out...’ He looked on the verge of tears. ‘I didn’t know !’

Logan took pity on him. ‘I looked it up. Section five point five of the Criminal Law — Consolidation Scotland — Act 1995, says you’ve got a defence if you genuinely believed she was over sixteen—’

‘I did! You know I did!’

‘And you’re under twenty-four years of age when the offence was committed.’

Rennie looked as if something special had just happened in his trousers. ‘I’m twenty-three!’ He closed his eyes and slid off the chair. ‘Oh thank you dear, sweet, fucking Jesus...’

‘You’re welcome. Now get your arse back up here, we’ve got more important things to worry about.’ He dumped the newspapers on the floor. ‘Like how the Flesher found Elizabeth Nichol.’

Rennie scrambled into the seat. ‘I never would’ve touched her if I’d known—’

‘Will you bloody concentrate? We’ve got two women out there who’re going to wind up as happy meals if we don’t do something. So come on: who knew where Nichol lived?’

Rennie scrubbed his face with his hands, relief oozing out of him like a very happy smell. ‘I don’t... Hospital: doctors, nurses, admin staff. They’d all have access to her patient records when she got admitted after the attack.’

‘Good, I want you to get someone up there, see if anyone fits Goulding’s latest profile. Who else knew?’

‘Police.’ The constable poked the desk. ‘We knew. Better yet, Faulds knew. Where was he Thursday night, eh?’

‘Oh for God’s—’

‘Think about it: we all went to the pub, but he didn’t come, did he? He’d be a dab hand at covering his tracks; knows forensic procedure inside and out; he’s got all them mystery bruises; and every time there’s a—’

‘Enough! OK? Faulds is not the bloody Flesher.’ Logan tossed PC Munro’s FLO report across the desk.

‘No need to get all—’

‘Read it, you idiot. Control says Munro called through an update at two o’clock: Elizabeth Nichol is local, forty-nine, single, lives alone; one sister, one brother. Both parents are dead... She likes swimming, romantic fiction, and collecting snow globes.’

‘No accounting for taste.’ Rennie flicked through the report till he got to the photograph of Elizabeth Nichol’s bruised face. ‘How come she’s not fat-tastic? Thought the Flesher liked them self-basting?’

‘Wrong place at the wrong time. If she hadn’t been borrowing a cookery book from the Youngs, he wouldn’t have touched her...’ Logan went back to the death board. ‘Mind you, Goulding thinks Nichol might be the end of some sort of chain — that she was a’close to home’ victim the Flesher’s been working up to.’

A thoughtful expression slowly crawled its way across Rennie’s face. ‘Maybe the Flesher followed her to the Youngs’ and they were the ones in the wrong place at the wrong time?’

‘Which brings us right back to how does the Flesher know her?’ Logan picked up the latest crime-scene photo from the board — Elizabeth Nichol’s lounge, covered in shattered snow globes and ruptured furniture. ‘There was no sign of forced entry, so she let him into her house. That makes him a friend, or a colleague, neighbour, or family member.’